Skull Session: Carnell Tate Thanks Buckeye Nation For Its Support, Chris Holtmann Sends Well Wishes to Bronny James and Santonio Holmes Makes Headlines in Football and Golf

By Chase Brown on August 1, 2023 at 5:00 am
Carnell Tate
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Welcome to the Skull Session.

I think this Lincoln Kienholz kid is gonna be pretty good.

Just a hunch I have.

Let's have a good Tuesday, shall we?

 WITH A THANKFUL HEART. On Monday, Ohio State wide receiver Carnell Tate thanked Buckeye Nation and others for the support he's received since the death of his mother earlier this month.

It is the first time Tate has made a public comment since Ashley Griggs, the mother of Tate, was killed in a drive-by shooting in Chicago on July 16. Local authorities stated the crime occurred when an occupant of a vehicle fired into a crowd of people who were leaving an event. The gunshots fatally wounded Tate’s mother.

At Big Ten Media Days last week, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day said the last two weeks have been hard for Tate as he grieves his loss.

"It was not easy for anybody, but certainly for Carnell. He and his mom were very close,” Day said. “When you lose somebody close to you like that, it just takes the rug out from underneath you, and I know that happened to Carnell. He does have a team that's here to support him. We've all kind of surrounded him and tried to help them the best we can. He’s a pretty private person as well.

"We've had guys who have gone through similar situations, and you have to go through a process of grieving. We've talked about that. That's not easy. But I think football has allowed him to have a distraction that gets his mind off of it when he's not in his room or back in Chicago.”

I admire that Day called grief "a process."

In his book, "A Grief Observed," C.S. Lewis reflected on the fundamental issues of life, death and loss after his wife, Joy Davidman, passed away in 1960. That reflection led to him write these words: "I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process.”

On Aug. 1, Tate is still at the start of that process. Hopefully, he continues to walk on the path toward healing. It makes my heart warm that he will have coaches, teammates, administrative staff and an entire Buckeye Nation who will support him as he goes.

 THAT'S PURE CLASS. After Bronny James suffered cardiac arrest at a USC men's basketball workout on July 24, the son of NBA superstar LeBron James had "countless people" sending love and prayers toward him in his recovery, LeBron tweeted in the days that followed Bronny's medical scare.

According to a recent article from The New York Times, one of the people who reached out to The James Gang was Ohio State head coach Chris Holtmann. From Adam Zagoria of NYT Sports:

Bronny James and his family also received well wishes from Ohio State Coach Chris Holtmann. In September 2022, during Bronny’s senior year at Sierra Canyon School in Los Angeles, Bronny and his father visited Ohio State for a football game against Notre Dame. The fans chanted, “We want Bronny.”

Ohio State was the school that LeBron, an Ohio native, had said he likely would have attended had he gone to college rather than jumping straight to the NBA as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2003 draft.

Holtmann said that he and his staff had been genuinely interested in landing Bronny.

“It was a situation where we just were really open about making sure it fit what they were looking for and vice versa,” Holtmann said by phone on Wednesday. “We knew it was going to be an experience where he may not be in college very long, so you want that experience to be a great one.”

A few months back, Adam Jardy of The Columbus Dispatch interviewed Holtmann and allowed the head coach to reflect on Ohio State's poor season in 2022-23, which saw the Buckeyes collect a 16-19 record and miss the NCAA and NIT tournaments. In the interview, Jardy included this Q&A between him and Holtmann:

Q. What do you still love about being a college coach? It’s been a tough year. Everyone probably considers a change here and there regardless of their line of work. What is it about the job that still keeps bringing you back? A. For me, it’s meaningful work. When I was thinking about a vocation, I wanted meaningful work. I just got into my 50s and the longer I live, the more I realize that there are things that matter and there are things that people think matter that just don’t matter. And meaningful work matters to me. Doing meaningful work matters to me at 50 more than it ever has. The moment I feel like it’s not significant, meaningful work for me is when I’ll choose a different profession. I get to impact, hopefully in a positive way, kids that I care about, impact futures, help kids navigate futures, help kids navigate the challenges of being an 18-to-22-year-old in a public way around all the stressors and challenges of being an athlete at a great university. The social media challenges of today’s kid. The mental health challenges of today’s kid and athlete. I find that to be meaningful work. I love competing. I love competition. I love the game. I love the strategy behind it. I love studying it.

Are there challenges? Yes. Are there days that I need a little bit of a pep talk, either from myself or someone else? Sure, but I think that’s true in anything you care about. My college coach gave me great advice, but one of the best thing is, “Find something that grabs your guts,” and this does for me.

Those are the words of a man who cares deeply for players, first and foremost at The Ohio State University, but also for the young men who chose to play their collegiate basketball elsewhere. That includes Bronny James, who Holtmann watched choose USC over the Buckeyes in a nationally covered and monitored recruiting battle that lasted until May.

Holtmann is pure class.

And as the 2023-24 college basketball season approaches, I hope the man with pure class can be a winner with the current assortment of Ohio State hoopers led by Bruce Thornton, Felix Okpara and Roddy Gayle Jr. and reinforced by a top-10 recruiting class of Scotty Middleton, Devin Royal, Taison Chatman and Austin Parks.

 HOLMES MAKES HEADLINES. Former Ohio State and Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Santonio Holmes appeared in the news last week when he attended the Steelers' preseason camp to instruct and teach the current black and gold pass-catchers.

Holmes was a standout wide receiver at Ohio State from 2002-05, collecting 140 receptions for 2,295 yards and 25 touchdowns for the Buckeyes. After his third collegiate season, Pittsburgh selected him with the No. 25 overall pick in 2006. He spent the first four years of his career with the Steelers, capped off with a Super Bowl MVP in 2009 as he secured the winning touchdown pass to help his team defeat the Arizona Cardinals, 27-23, and win Super Bowl XLIII.

Holmes spent the next five seasons with the New York Jets (2010-13) and Chicago Bears (2014). Three years later, in 2017, Holmes officially announced his retirement from the league, having racked up 389 catches, 6,030 yards and 36 touchdowns in 112 combined appearances with the three NFL franchises.

That said, I think Holmes knows some #stuff about how to play wide receiver, and the Steelers are lucky to have him around this preseason.

Holmes has also made headlines in 2023 for his foundation, 10 ALL IN. Based in his hometown of Belle Glade, Florida, the foundation aims to promote STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics) education, mental health awareness, diversity and inclusion. He's raised money for the foundation through the game of golf, a sport he's come to love in recent years.

In a recent article for the PGA Tour’s website, Helen Ross wrote about Holmes' relationship with the sport and his work with 10 ALL IN:

NFL Hall of Famer Jerry Rice introduced Holmes to golf after his 2006 rookie season with the Pittsburgh Steelers. However, the wide receiver, who played nine seasons in the NFL, didn’t begin to take the game seriously until after his retirement in 2017 following a serious Lisfranc fracture.

...

Holmes says his current handicap is a 9 or 10. He loves the challenge of playing from the tips and the feeling of confidence he has gained as a result. He works on his game with the same singular focus he had while playing football: by analyzing every mistake.

“I approach that with every aspect of how I played professional football because every route that wasn't ran to my perfection or my liking, I dissected it in between what caused this to not be in the right setting,” the soft-spoken Holmes says. “And I admire that so much from watching the pro (golfers), how they approach the game.”

...

In February, he hosted a golf tournament during the Super Bowl to raise money for his foundation, 10 ALL IN. The organization promotes STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics) education, mental health awareness and diversity and inclusion. Holmes is already exploring venues for next February in Las Vegas.

“I'm super excited about that,” he says. “And to be within an environment that allows me to speak about what I'm passionate about and that's giving back to our young people and teaching them this game and giving them access to tools that can get them so much further in life than sitting at home watching someone on television.

“You can pick up this game and go out and meet someone at the golf course that could actually change your life.”

Holmes has been and always will be a stud. Cheers to him for the work he has done and will continue to do with 10ALLIN and beyond.

 OLYMPIC VILLAGE. On Monday, the Ohio State wrestling and men's lacrosse teams took part in a construction project in downtown Columbus that will ultimately result in the largest Ronald McDonald House in the United States.

Wrestlers and lacrosse players assisted with the demolition of the kitchen and dining room at the current Ronald McDonald House location, located at 711 E. Livingston Ave. across the street from Nationwide Children's Hospital. The athletes also helped move furniture and appliances, remove flooring and build shelving, among other activities.

In the wise words of Eleven Warriors legend Andy Vance, the Buckeyes were paying it forward to those in need, which should make Ohio State fans proud.

 SONG OF THE DAY. "Intuition" by The Backseat Lovers.

 CUT TO THE CHASE. Damar Hamlin puts aside fear and practices in pads for the first time since cardiac arrest... Stork has wings full with four babies... Paul Reubens, actor best known as Pee-wee Herman, dies at 70...  8-year-old boy survives cougar attack at national park in Washington state.

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